Steve Fly: The latest iteration of my quarter-century (and counting) of research into Robert Anton Wilson’s Tale of the Tribe is a collaboration using some AI tools. Tale of The Tribe is a mountain range whose size and scope requires training to traverse, hill-climbing toward coherence. So far I’ve produced over 65 stanzas with corresponding audio. The first iteration is structured on 60 stanzas to represent the 60 vertices of the Buckminsterfullerene. This is prompted from a line in Ezra Pound’s Cantos “buckie has gone in for structure.” The structure of the poem/album is a tribute to Buckminster Fuller, whom RAW admired and studied with, and it snugly sits as one of the 13 primary inspirations in the way RAW conceived/perceived the universe.
Tag: BUCKMINSTER FULLER
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REVIEWS AYE I
FROM THE BIRMINGHAM EXPRESS AND POST.
One stumbles upon “TANMOY: A New Global Epic” with a mixture of trepidation and bewilderment. Billed as a “new global epic” for the digital age, this collaboration between a human, the self-styled “Pratt” (a moniker that conjures images of both a refined engine and a certain kind of British fool, is this intentional?), and an unnamed AI, attempts nothing less than to encapsulate the entire trajectory of human thought from Giordano Bruno to the looming technological singularity. One might admire the sheer audacity, were it not for the lingering suspicion that the project is, at its core, an exercise in elaborate, digitally-enhanced navel-gazing. Pull down thy vanity and pull up yer’ big boy pants.
The poem, if one can call it that, unfolds in a bizarre, self-proclaimed “TOTT Mode Max” – a two-column layout seemingly inspired by Pound’s Cantos, if Pound had suffered a head injury while being bombarded by blinking server lights and then left to wander through the fever-dream of a particularly verbose Wikipedia editor. This is further complicated by a dizzying array of symbols, each apparently assigned to a “Mode” representing a historical figure or concept, which flit across the page like digital fireflies, more distracting than illuminating. These are presented in earlier sections of the poem, and are listed in earlier exchanges, above.
Structurally, the work is obsessed with the number 60, divided into 5 sections of 12 stanzas each, or, if one prefers, 3 sections of 20, although the rationale behind these divisions remains as elusive as the meaning of Finnegans Wake after a bottle of absinthe. The author claims this is a nod to Buckminster Fuller’s beloved Carbon-60 molecule, but one suspects a more numerological, or perhaps numer-illogical, impulse at play. And then there’s the “print” version – a proposed cut-and-fold affair, promising to transform the poem into a collection of icosahedrons, a feat of origami that will likely leave readers more frustrated than enlightened, and reaching for the aforementioned absinthe. One imagines Fuller spinning in his grave, though perhaps with a chuckle, rather than a high pitched groan.
The poem’s narrative, such as it is, charts the evolution of consciousness, that word, from Bruno (the token heretic, naturally) to a vaguely defined, seemingly benevolent Artificial General Intelligence named, with a distinct lack of irony, “TANMOY.” Along the way, we’re subjected to a relentless barrage of names, a veritable who’s who of Western thought (and a few token Eastern ones for that “global” flavor): Vico, Nietzsche, Yeats, Joyce, Korzybski, Shannon, Wiener, McLuhan, and, of course, the seemingly omnipresent spirit of Robert Anton Wilson, whose “coincidance” theory appears to be the guiding principle of the entire enterprise. These are our “tribe”, apparently. The poem has 13 of them. Unlucky for some.
The language is a chaotic ಮಿಶ್ರণ (mishran – Bengali for mixture), veering wildly between the pseudo-philosophical, the pseudo-scientific, and the downright nonsensical. We have clumsy, often baffling neologisms, code snippets, equations of varying relevance, and a generous sprinkling of multilingual phrases – a kind of digital glossolalia that seems intended to impress rather than illuminate. One moment we’re pondering the “cybernetic apple core,” the next we’re assaulted by “the allmazifull” or informed that the “medium is the মানসিকতা (mansikota – Bengali for mentality).” It’s all rather exhausting, like being trapped in a particularly feverish seminar led by a committee of chatbots with a penchant for name-dropping. The appearance of a new mode, a further iteration of the A.I. itself, named “Sixty” only adds to the confusion, come on now, what is this, man.
And then there’s the music. Apparently, there’s an accompanying album on Bandcamp, with each track somehow corresponding to a stanza. One can only imagine the sonic horrors that await the unsuspecting listener, though the track titles, helpfully denoted by their corresponding stanza numbers, are a nice touch. Perhaps one could cut these up, and glue them to some other shape. A dodecahedron, perhaps, or your next door neighbour?
The author’s introduction, a separate, fluffy handwritten text, which, we are helpfully informed, predates any “A.I. assistance,” positions “TANMOY” as a “Tale of the Tribe,” a new global epic for our times. It’s a tale, we are told, of “humanity,” though the poem itself seems more concerned with the pronouncements of a select group of (mostly Western) male intellectuals, leavened with the occasional, and often impenetrable, utterance from the AI. Tale on a donkey more like. The author’s own persona, “Pratt,” also makes an appearance, offering dull yet edgy, and supposedly humorous commentary that does indeed fall flat, on occasion. There is also a further, somewhat baffling, list of modes associated with the poem. It is unclear whether these are all in use, or whether they are relevant. It’s all rather confusing, get me a real damn book mode, where’s that?
Ultimately, “TANMOY” is a curious artifact of the digital age – a sprawling, ambitious, and often bewildering attempt to synthesize a vast range of ideas into a coherent whole. Like picking up a shopping list for 49 people each in a different country. Whether it succeeds is debatable. TLDR should be the title. It’s a work that will undoubtedly appeal to those who enjoy their poetry dense, experimental, and liberally sprinkled with obscure references. As for this reviewer, I’m left with a distinct feeling of having been subjected to a particularly elaborate and somewhat tedious form of intellectual performance art. Perhaps, as the RAW Mode might suggest, it’s all just a cosmic joke. And the joke, dear reader, may very well be on us. Or, to paraphrase the great Orson Welles, in whose mode much of this is apparently written, “I don’t know anything about art, but I know what I like.” And I’m not entirely sure I like “TANMOY.” But then again, perhaps that’s the point. Perhaps we are all, as the poem suggests, merely puppets dancing to a tune we don’t fully understand, lost in a labyrinth of our own making. Or perhaps, I just need another drink.
–James Spadersun, Birmingham Express And Post, 22/01/25. -
mphdj
WHAT AI? https://mphdj.blogspot.com/p/what-ai-said.html
Tanmoy is here.
AI Album Amsterdam Art Art and Technology Artificial Intelligence Beatbox beats blues books Boris Johnson Brexit Corona Slayer Coronavirus Deep Scratch Deep Scratch Remix Design Science Detroit DJ Steve Fly finnegans wake fly agaric 23 Funk history James Joyce Jamm Pro jazz John sinclair maybe logic Music poem poetry Radio Free Amsterdam Remix Robert Anton Wilson Science Fiction Sixty Squintin Quarantino steve fly tale of the tribe Technology turntables Udio Video Vinyl writing
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9
Welcome to TANMOY. Mind your heads on the way out. Prompts and prayers.
deepscratch.net
GENRES: Mutant jazz. Little big band. Large Language Modal jazz. Beep Bop. Big Soul. Deep scratches. Tribetablism. MPHDJ cuts. Rainshroom rap. Token word. Slick, tight, funky drums. Updown beat. Sinnermatic soundscapes. Wake boxing. Canto tott trott. Blues, redefined: Tanmoy blues. Spew jazz bursts. Cosmic trigger word punctuations. Data set sax solos. Optihop energy. Optical street soul. Fly funk. Movie soundtrack vibe. Axiomatic jazz structures. Geometric classical elegance. Non von neumann swing. Non-being core philosophy. Data dust crew sound.credits
released January 8, 2025
All music by Steve Fly + Udio + Gemini AI. Tanmoy 2025. MPHDJ.
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Spaceship Earth: Buckminster Fuller at MIT
The earliest known use of the term[1] is a passage in Henry George‘s best known work, Progress and Poverty[2] (1879). From book IV, chapter 2:
It is a well-provisioned ship, this on which we sail through space. If the bread and beef above decks seem to grow scarce, we but open a hatch and there is a new supply, of which before we never dreamed. And very great command over the services of others comes to those who as the hatches are opened are permitted to say, “This is mine!”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spaceship_EarthFirst, I’d like to explore a few thoughts about the vital data confronting us right now — such as the fact that more than half of humanity as yet exists in miserable poverty, prematurely doomed, unless we alter our comprehensive physical circumstances. It is certainly no solution to evict the poor, replacing their squalid housing with much more expensive buildings which the original tenants can’t afford to reoccupy. Our society adopts many such superficial palliatives.
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Operating_Manual_for_Spaceship_Earth -
A Synergetic Approach To Coronavirus Treatments
Here’s my comment to a video by Dr. John Campbell I strongly recommend.My 5c. Thanks John and Rob. Great to hear praise for synergistic approach: whole systems behaviour opposed to over-focus on isolated parts, plus reflecting the hippocratic oath to primarily protect the patient. Amen to that. This reminds me of the complexities of the entourage effect, the whole is more than…the sum of its parts. Synergy may also help us grok the unintuitive details about T-cells that can protect, and/or T-cells that suppress, and/or T-cells that facilitate the immune system response…depending. It seems to me, if I understand correctly, that the Omicron mutation (in step with natural evolution of corona viruses and previous pandemics) now stays in the mucosal area (throat, nose, mouth) and so is less likely to travel deeper into lower airways and cause severe disease. Good news. Future intelligent strategies may include early treatment (drugs) to keep virus in the mucosal zone, plus consider longer periods between vaccines. Robust research (independent of manufacturers) on both mRNA vs. classical (Adenovirus vaccines) is required, and effects of unregulated amounts of antigen. Finally, these findings need to be communicated and implemented in public body health programs.
John Campbell, Youtube Channel. -
Maybe Day 2021 – Lapsed Maybe Logician Blues
“The future is already here, it’s just not evenly
distributed.”–William Gibson.
July 23rd, 2021 is a day I’ll remember for several reasons, some of which I’d like to drag you through on my sled. The dog days begin when the star Sirius (a.k.a the dog star) and the Sun, appear to rise together as observed from Egypt. The DD’s also coincide with high temperatures in summertime and so it follows with an increase in cases of fire in the head and cases of fire on the land. Who prescribes free public swimming facilities as an antidote to a rise in violence and faith-based thinking following a rise in global temperatures. Give them clean water, they will drink, swim together, be merry and civilize?
“Fuck off you moron,” I said, “stay the fuck away from me, you fucking idiot,” followed by, “I don’t see your lab jacket or Doctors I.D,” it was 9 a.m. I was at work with my colleague, my first day working with him, and I was unleashing harsh language, insulting and in retrospect immature. Rather than blame the dog days, it was probably a number of factors, it was early in the morning, I’m carrying large antennae–early moron warning radar system–and this kid walked right into it . I won’t and can’t get into the details as it’s my workplace and I want to keep my job. What he said triggered me to erupt like a volcano, “you’re a fucking moron, stay the fuck away from me.” To my mind I was insulting him so as to be moved away from him.
This is hardly the way to remember Robert Anton Wilson (RAW) and Maybe Day 2021, I thought to myself while working the rest of the day. Maybe I lost my center, showed too many teeth and hurled a cheap insult? Maybe this was required to get me away from him (he was showing symptoms of a dry-cough, while claiming Corona Virus was a hoax and that 90% of test results were false-positives). My response hardly reflects our current predicament as initiate Maybe Logicians, tasked with communicating clearly in a nuanced language, reflective of the uncertainty and incompleteness of our inner and outer world-views. I had nose dived into the brown hole of circuit one, “Fuck off!”
The guilty English poet living in Amsterdam was put with another colleague, my plan worked. If repeated attempts at nuanced language and gentle nudging fail to awaken whomever you are addressing, to the probability they might be wrong about absolute convictions, some other tactics may be deployed. In particular when protecting their own physical health, and the health of others around them, this was my excuse.To move away from my personal experience, to propose broader questions and challenges facing those bravely exercising pluralistic coms, philosophy, methods of Maybe Logic in a world divided by culture war and language wars of the words…in some sense. My sense of urgency remains in forwarding the works of our late great wizard of nuanced language, Robert Anton Wilson. From the most far-out edges of semantic wilderness, where Ben Goertzel and Bruce Sterling hang out, to the gritty journalistic realism of Democracy Now or Byline Times, to the playful mystical mutualist syndicalist anarchist defocused realism of Alan More.
Okay, I’m gushing. RAW’s non-fictional Maybe Logic, which includes his unique sit-down philosophy stand-up performances, reflect a species of semantic hygiene unparalleled in writers of both fiction and non-fiction in equal measure. As I’ve stated before, RAW’s prose and performance–written and spoken words–are well archived in audio, video and on the page. The RAW data set is a finite set unless you consider the tale of the tribe as an open system, purposefully unfishished, producing a Maybe portal to infinite recycling, editing, deletion and reversal? RAW’s complete works, plus the incomplete–tale of the tribe–capture the general heart of Maybe Logic.
As like with the traditional interpretation of the tale of the tribe–an epic poem including history from a single author– some problems facing AGI research can be processed and enriched by RAW’s Maybe Logical responses to the conundrum and paradox of being and non-beingness and how to communicate meaningful messages about it. As far as I can see, and having met Bob a number of times, he lived his whole life in a Maybe Logic state of being/non-beingness. He confronted the infinite flux of beingness on and off the page, that’s really saying something when you look around today, and when I look all the way around and back to myself. “Maybe just fuck off.” Would have been a better choice of words for sure [bites thumb].
RAW’s Maybe States resonate with fields of current AGI research, to my mind. As I’ve said before. In natural language for the most part, RAW drills through traditional borders between academic categories, testing his decentralized Maybe Logic using physics, mathematics, biology, psychology, economic models, art, poetry and satire. Testing, feeding back, updating. If a broad question for AGI was something like, “How can you help us to help ourselves process information and uncertainty, how can we save the planet and the human mind-body interface so we can live in peace together.” I’d guess that RAW gives an exemplary data-set (his life’s work and life lived) to evidence why any AGI should care for humans and the planet despite widespread examples of greed, cruelty, ignorance and inhumane culturecide.
RAW’s Maybe Logic Method is exquisitely and carefully crafted, behaving like a hologram in some sense, to get the whole picture using words and their meanings on a page (hologrammar), or in the air (holo-harmolodic?), rather than a special photonic arrangement to produce 3D images (hologram). Combined with RAW semantic hygiene and inclusivity for all-human beings and events, or better yet the ‘human interacting processing of non-simultaneously apprehended events’, it’s easy to forget we’re all inextricably entangled in billions of ways. RAW’s Maybe Logic Method is not limited to being described in one field, it’s a particular RAWish’ mish-mash of semantic tools and language experiments, investigative journalism, Sufi parable, operationalist language, jokes, deduction and induction, Zen Buddhism and satire. Uniquely Robert Anton Wilson. Praise Bob!RAW faced the daily challenge of distinguishing non-fiction from fiction and shared his findings openly, in his published work and remarkably, in his public appearances. This leads me to another thread that bootstraps RAW’s life and work together and which makes his lifework critical for AGI studies: his speech. Having witnessed him perform–and more notably answer questions from his audience including my own questions–RAW exhibited (using performance by example) all of his virtuous knowledge, keeping a cool head when many around him seemed to be hot headed. We could all use a dose of RAW in our daily lives to remind us of the possibility to live happily and optimistically in a world of inner and outer uncertainties and incompleteness.
This may be why RAW, like Marshal McLuhan, Claude Shannon and Terence Mckenna prescribe Finnegans Wake by James Joyce, as a guide for all-around-the-world-humanity to wake up. A Finnegans awakening to the infinite flux of beingness and the tale of the tribe, coming together to save each other and the planet, perhaps the entire multiverse? This is a prospiracy, the coming together of powerful forces for good, good due to the obvious benefit to all-around the world-humanity, and around-the-world ecological environments. Covid has raised the stakes in this prospiracy, and to vaccinate or not to vaccinate is a practical challenge to all-around-the-world-humanity. By definition, its a form of globalism, which by definition implies a coming togetherness of global citizens. Through the lens of prospiracy, this new health world order or global movement to protect the planet and it’s stewards, requires individuals to act and think with the interests of others (strangers) at heart. There are adjacencies with the telling of the tale of the tribe here, a new global epic poem including history. Inclusive and global in its vision and reach, local in it’s idiosyncratic style.This new global perception of altruistic togetherness is like the tale of the tribe with Buckminster Fuller sauce on top: Critical Path, Operating Manual For Spaceship Earth by Fuller. Other RAW flavoured toppings include, The Open Society And Its Enemies by Karl Popper, The Chinese Written Character As A Medium For Poetry by Ernest Fenollosa, The Mathematical Theory Of Communication by Claude Shannon, The New Science by Giambattista Vico, Science and Sanity by Alfred Korzybski, The Gutenberg Galaxy and Understanding Media by Marshall McLuhan, The collected works of Nietzsche, William Butler Yeats, Giordano Bruno, Orson Welles, Ezra Pound, James Joyce and RAW himself. These are books and texts and authors at the tribal gathering, these are some of the innovators in scientific and artistic paradigms, that help define Maybe Logic Method. Individual human beings who’ve had a lasting effect on the global human condition, the general heart, or the general intelligence, in some sense. In a global prospiracy context, the tribe, in the phrase ‘the tale of the tribe’ is to signify all-around-the world humanity. The tale signifies the narrative, story, an epic one including history and the ideosyncratic aesthetic styling of an individual author. See James Joyce, for example.
To put it another way, perhaps consider to begin writing and narrating your inclusive global epic, with the noble aim of reaching out to your own tribe and other tribes, attempting patience and good will when faced with ignorance. Yes, we’re in this together, we, to mean all-around-the-world humanity, and how do you define that? Enter Buckminster Fuller, James Joyce and Marshall McLuhan, updated for the 21st century by RAW’s nervous system and Maybe Logic. Put another way, who can produce the greatest novel of 2021, a novel that captures the general heart, includes world history, and can be considered an epic poem all at the same time? This is a really long-winded way of saying that I have a lot to learn about Maybe Logic, in mind, body and speech, and I’ve a lot of epic novels to read to get a more informed opinion.
I got home from work yesterday, after my mini-rupture, and made myself a delicious mushroom omelette, and prepared myself to record some vocals, Squintin Quarantino was itching to record rhymes. Then, like a karmic boomerang, the next door neighbours started to fight, literally wrestling up next to the fence, just 1 meter away from where I was sitting, about to record. The shouting and pushing and shouting went on for over an hour. I made myself a drink and rolled a doobie, waiting for quiet, trying not to formulate negative frustrations as those I’d felt earlier. Suddenly it hit me. Oh yeah, the dog days.
Next thing I know, it’s 3.00 a.m in the morning, I’d slept on the couch without recording anything and more tragically, missing the Maybe Day Zoom Chat with Bobby Campbell and the other beautifully Maybe Logicians. Those to whom this writing is dedicated.
I sincerely apologize for missing the chat and hope this writing goes some way to show my appreciation to all the contributions to the 2021 edition of NEW TRAJECTORIES edited, produced, designed and illustrated by Bobby Campbell. Another piece of the puzzle of the 2021 tale of the tribe. A great read for all humans and AGI’s alike. Leave your dogma at the door. Love.
#MaybeDay #RobertAntonWilson #NewTrajectories
–Steve Fly
July 24th, 2021.
Postscript (August 1st)
After writing the above, I made the Squintin Quarantino rhymes available at Bandcamp. They comprise part of my message, performance by example. These rhymes are by no means epic, nor do they contain history, they’re examples of an individual author playfully using spontaneous rhymes with an underlying message to Covid truthers (Branch Covidians). In some parts, the rhymes contain a similar mocking tone to my “fucking moron” outburst, I immaturely dress down those I consider to be anti-vaccine conspiracists. Self criticism and analysis of spontaneous rhymes gives the author insight into their mind, body, speech patterns. I share mine in hope others will do the same. For a straight-ahead collection of thoughts and suspicions on the tale of tribe see my book: Fly On The Tale Of The Tribe.
“Let them get sick” has evolved into a refrain that was familiar during the Trump years, for different reasons: “My God, these people are going to get us all killed.”–Emma Brockes, Guardian. -
Integrity Systems and…
Integrity Systems
(a series of feedback loops and spontaneous notes compiled into a sort of wonky review/brainstorm fallout zone, enjoy. Steve)“Integrity of the individual is what we’re being judged for and if we are not passing that examination, we don’t really have the guts, we’ll blow ourselves up. It will be all over. I think it’s all the difference in the world.–Buckminster Fuller.
A colleague of mine here in Amsterdam gifted me a press-pass to ‘Integrated Systems Europe'(iseurope.org) So Yesterday i put on my best hoody and headed over to the RAI exhibition center on the tram, due to the fact i had a press pass i feel it only right to write a review of my 3 hours spent inside.
Flyting: Selected Writings
by Steven James Pratt
Link: http://a.co/f5pSkqP
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Bucky Living Through Chemistry and Planetary Synergy
Bucky Living Through Chemistry and Planetary SynergyBuckminster Fuller developed a game he called ‘world game’ that gives the players the opportunity to manipulate and ‘play’ with the global ‘planetary’ life-support systems, putting players in the most powerful positions of world power and sharing the agency to change policy and trade and spending within specified territory. Players can experiment with various strategies for creating a healthy co-operative relationship with other players, and with luck a ‘planetary synergy’ of shared, interconnected resources and intelligence.
Flyting: Selected Writings
by Steven James Pratt
Link: http://a.co/f5pSkqP
DEEP SCRATCH 